While “going out for Chinese food” was possible, it was not the popular norm.

Most just had basic cooks, making basic American fare, in a restaurant’s humble kitchen. Restaurants did not offer a lot of fancy themes or cultural food choices either.

There were very, very few restaurants that had chefs who went to school to learn to cook a 5-course meal. It’s interesting to note that were not a lot of fine or “gourmet” restaurants to dine at back then. (The guy in the car kind of looks like Buddy Holly in his Wayfarers, but it’s not.) Waitresses would come out to take customers orders when they drove up. I wonder how they didn’t always drop the food like on the beginning theme of the first episodes of “Happy Days”. Some drive-in restaurants even had waitresses on roller skates. There were many burger places called “drive-ins” where you would simply drive up to and they’d come out and serve you in your car! This is how A&W and McDonalds started. I only recently realized that “Drive-In” didn’t always mean a movie was showing. Another iconic 50’s dine out option were Drive-Ins. Then, of course were the diners and malt shops frequented by courting teens that we have come to love as a nostalgic picture of a great era gone by. Most restaurants in the 50’s were simple, decent, family places where you would sit and enjoy wholesome comfort food in a homey setting. Pizza places had not even begun to come into existence then, and if you wanted a pie, you’d have to go to an actual Italian restaurant to get one! You could also not just pick up the phone and order a pizza in the 50’s. All that quickie, commercial junk food came later. There was NO Burger King, Carls Jr., Jack In The Box or Taco Bell. The original McDonald’s was one of many burger places. There were actually no fast food places, and all things considered, that’s a good thing. Most of the fast food and easy-to-prepare ready products that we take for granted today did not exist in the 1950’s. The 1950’s were wonderful, but what did the people of that time eat? I’m not trying to make them sound like an ancient civilization here, but in reality the mid-20th Century was a LONG time ago and many things have changed in the American Diet.

Milk- junk jack retro